Tampa Bay Lightning

Three games. Four goals. Not good.
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Marc Denis got nothing for his 18 save on 19 shot effort tonight, and what is deeply concerning is not only are "the big three" not scoring but, with the exception of Martin St. Louis, they're not even getting chances. Hopefully the sieve-like Florida Panthers, which 55 minutes in has already allowed 44 shots to Toronto tonight, will be the balm the ailing Lightning offense needs.
Game sheet from [url=http://www.nhl.com/scores/htmlreports/20062007/GS020037.HTM]NHL.com[/url].

Dimitry Afanasenkov's ridiculous turnover on Boston's winning goal will get all the attention, but the real problem right now is two games into the season Lecavalier, Richards and St. Louis have zero goals.
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Marc Denis stopped 22 of 25 in the loss. Goals scored by Ruslan Fedotenko and Bolt Prospects alumni [url=ryan-craig]Ryan Craig[/url].
Game sheet from [url=http://www.nhl.com/scores/htmlreports/20062007/GS020025.HTM]NHL.com.[/url]
Doug Janik played 13:23 as the Lightning once again went with 7 d-men. Eric Perrin took a tremendous leap in ice time going to 18:14 of +1 hockey with 2 shots and 1 blocked shot as well as going 60% on draws. [url=nick-tarnasky]Nick Tarnasky[/url] made his debut tonight playing just 3:49 with 1 hit.

I myself like many of us am not a fan of our umbrella power play offense. I'm guessing that Tort's and Rammer don't much care for it either. Why use it then? Let's look at our Big 4. Richards mans the point and is not a down low in-front-of-net physical player in 5 on 5 situations either. Boyle is a smallish defenseman with good mobility - not Kubina who was large and willing to try to go to the front of the net. St. Louis - kinda like a baseline player in basketball. Hangs on the goal line, is good at the sharp angle shot and the cross ice pass, but not an inside guy. Vinny? In the playoffs in the Montreal forum - he's a down-low "Give me the damn puck" kind of a guy. At any other venue and in any non-playoff situation he aspires to be a point man. Craig is doing well and may turn ouy to be special, but the one place I really feel the loss of R2 affects us is right here. When he had time with the umbrella guys, the goalie didn't have much opportunity to see what's going on out there.

That was entertaining.
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I thought the Lightning played their system to a tee tonight with only a couple of blemishes on an otherwise masterful defensive performance. To hold ANY NHL team, much less one with Ilya Kovalchuk and Marian Hossa on it, to just 11 shots in 65 minutes of play is amazing. Some of that is due to the Thrashers having a completely watered down roster with little if not nothing at the center position this year, but a lot of it also has to do with an outstanding total team effort from Denis, the defensive corps and hard backchecking from the Lightning's forwards.
Game sheet from [url=http://sports.yahoo.com/nhl/boxscore?gid=2006100528]yahoo.com[/url] because the NHL website is still working out the bugs on their new design.

It's a little over 3 hours until the puck drops on the 2006-2007 season. Looking around the internet, including this site, it seems the Lightning fan base has divided into two camps. One camp seems to believe the acquisition of Marc Denis will propel the Lightning back into the stratosphere of the Eastern Conference elite. The other camp seems far more pessimistic and tends to believe what much of the national hockey media is spouting about the Lightning falling from playoff contention this season. Both sides seem pretty dug in with their beliefs and both sides have shared a good amount vitriol with their counterparts on the other side. Both sides need to slow down.
I don't know. You don't either.
I suspect this is the nature of the beast in the new NHL where teams will be remaking at least 1/4 of their roster every offseason due to the relaxed free agency rules and the salary cap. It's impossible to tell how this year's version of the Tampa Bay Lightning will perform, and anyone who tells you they know one way or the other is dilluding themself. Team chemistry is a mysterious thing and, I would argue, not even John Tortorella has a complete idea when, if or how this team will gel with its new additions. With that in mind, here are some of the questions that will begin to be answered tonight in Atlanta: